Lykð
by the ticking clock
Summary: He pretends the wetness on his cheeks is another illusion. Spoilers for Dark World.


**Just got back from seeing Dark World and am still emotionally compromised by the sheer of awesomeness of Loki's story arch in the movie. (Can you say PLOT TWIST?!) The title comes from the Old Norse words for "End" Here is the site where I got that translation: Old_Norse_Dictionary_ #e**

**References to Norse Mythology. **

**This is not my best writing(Not by a long shot) but I am so excited and thrilled about this movie :) Leave your thoughts on the movie and this little one shot in a review? **

"Then am I not your mother?"

He stares at her for a few seconds, this image in his cell of the woman he has called mother for as long as he can remember. He has memories of her healing his wounds, singing him to sleep, holding him in her arms as he sobbed...if she is not his mother than who is?

But he has to say it. "No," the word is clear, but even she can see the denial in it. "you are not."

A quick flash of a pained smile, and she cuts him with her words like she always has, brings him down in the gentlest way possible, and leaves him questioning everything.

He reaches for her, but his fingers pass through the illusion, and he is once again standing alone in the cage.

* * *

They tell him last.

He's heard the fighting above, the screams, the sobs. But those are all normal-the song of war and destruction. When the guard finally comes to his cell, his downcast eyes catch Loki's attention first. His first though is of Thor, but this man would not look so defeated and terrified if it were...

_No. _

He denies the words, fights them, but they fall on his ears anyway: _Frigga is dead. _

Loki wants to strangle the messenger, wants to fight and rage and kill whoever is responsible for this, but he is trapped in this prison with his books(Frigga had always known how to make him comfortable-fill him up with words) unable to avenge the only person who has ever mattered.

When the guard takes his leave, Loki takes his rage out on the room, and himself.

* * *

He doesn't know how long he sits there, with the cell in pieces around him, his foot bloodied, his throat raw from screaming. He's too exhausted to even lift his head. When he closes his eyes, he can see Frigga bending over him, her hands stroking back his hair, whispering, "why do you do these things to yourself, Loki?"

When he hears Thor coming, he slips into an illusion, but of course his brother can see right through it.

Thor's eyes are red and tired but there is steel in his gaze, and Loki feels something like respect flicker in his chest before Thor tells him to stop the tricks.

Slowly, he lets the magic flow through his body, savoring this thing, this precious aspect of his being that connects him to his mother, until Thor can see him as he really is.

He half expects pity(_sentiment) _but Thor only looks at him, says he will kill him, asks for his help, and leaves.

What a surprise.

* * *

With Thor he slips the facade back on.

In all honesty he enjoys it. The teasing, the banter, the tricks. He's been surrounded by so much chaos lately that mischief hasn't had time to sink into his bones, but he lets it out now. Frigga had always enjoyed his tricks as a child, like Odin or Thor never did. He unleashes the fire in himself through taunts, and for a short time Thor is so frustrated that it is almost like they are children again.

He longs for that childhood-of blissful evenings spent reading with his mother, her fingers twined through his hair, both of them bent over a spell book, whispering secrets.

She had always known all of his secrets. He'd never been able to hide from her what the rest of the worlds ignored:

He _cares. _

* * *

The thrill of flying that ship makes him giddy.

They slice through rock and he screams, almost hoping that they will crash and burn and sink into nothingness. But only for half a second, because then they are on the other side and he turns to Thor and cries, "ta-da!" because it is expected, and because he can't resist a little dramatics.

* * *

Thor provokes him.

Loki does not want it to happen, but he barely holding this form together, this illusion of calculated calm, and word of Frigga pushes him over the edge.

His throat tears when he screams, "Who put me there?" then Thor steps back and the pain in Loki's chest builds until he can't breathe and he sucks in a gasp and cries the words with everything he has, "WHO PUT ME THERE?"

Thor rushes him, and Loki lets himself be slammed up against the ship wall, blinking to clear his eyes and pull Thor's poised fist into focus, but all he can see is a blur of flesh.

For a minute it seems like Thor is actually going to hit him, but then he pulls away with a gasp. "She wouldn't want us to fight."

No, Frigga had never approved of their quarrels, even as children when they were decidedly less lethal. If he regrets any of his fights with Thor it is because they caused her pain.

But she had come to expect their arguments. She'd commented on it, once, laughing. "My boys," she'd said, "two opposites, tugging and fighting but always coming back to each other."

He smiles a little when he thinks of that and quips, "Well, she wouldn't be surprised."

* * *

There's something invigorating about fighting side by side with Thor again.

His brother is all brute strength and shouting, and Loki weaves illusion around him until the body he kicks is not his brothers, the hand he slices free from the wrist nothing but crackling mind games. That does not stop him from getting the smallest bit of satisfaction out of it, but he realizes even as he dives to protect the silly mortal girl, that he really does care about his brother.

Yes. _Brother. _

As the fighting continues, he weaves in and out of his opponents as his mother taught him, and he can almost feel her there with him, guiding his arm and whispering spells and illusions into his ears.

_I hear you, mother, _he thinks, and ducks as Thor shouts. _I hear you. _

* * *

The spear hurts, even though he knows he will shift from this form soon.

He falls to the ground and almost wishes this was real. That he is going to join his mother, that this life of suffering he has endured for however many thousand years will end.

And Thor.

Thor, who is soothing him and holding him, Thor who has lost so much, Thor who Loki despises and fights and loves.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he says, over and over. "I'm sorry."

And he is.

* * *

He finds a small way to show his pride in his brother, speaking through Odin's voice and image. He sits on the throne and smirks at the feeling of power within his grasp, tingling like magic through his nerves.

As Thor walks away from him, smiling and fulfilled by yet another illusion, Loki whispers a silent thank you to his mother.

She taught him the magic he knows and raised him on songs and gentle touches and healing hymns. He owes his careful twist of runes and spells to her.

He owes everything to her.

"I'm sorry," he says again, "you never should have left."

Deep in the recesses of the Earth he can sense his daughter, Hel, collecting the souls of the dead. He listens for Frigga's soul-song, but she is somewhere in the sky and out of the reach of the rotting-flesh hands of his daughter. Perhaps that is for the best.

He slips back into Odin's form and calls to his stallion, the eight legged horse who is son.

Slepnir sees through the illusion and neighs a greeting. Loki bows his head low. "Hello," he whispers in the Allfather's deep tones, "are you ready to run?"

His son tosses his head and kicks out with four of his legs, and Loki swings himself up onto the horse's back.

They take off, the wind and the god and the horse blurring together until Loki feels nothing but the chaos and the simplicity of the realms moving around them.

He pretends that the wetness on his cheeks is another illusion.


End file.
